Today’s News 19th November 2018

• Italy Throws Down The Gauntlet To Challenge The Brussels Establishment

  Authored by Arkady Savitsky via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

  The EU has had a lot of trouble on its hands, as its members, such as Poland and Hungary, are openly challenging the established order. This time it’s a very serious situation, because Brussels is facing defiance from Italy, the 3rd largest national economy in the eurozone and the 8th largest global economy in terms of nominal GDP. It has a population of over 60 million. It is also a Europhile country and the bloc’s founding member.

  

  The Italian government has rejected the EU’s calls to revise its draft budget for 2019 that includes a 2.4% deficit of GDP, which could dangerously boost the nation’s public debt. The ruling coalition in Rome, which is made up of the League and the populist Five Star Movement, has decided to increase borrowing so that it can fund its campaign promises, such as lowering the retirement age and increasing welfare payments.

  Last month the European Commission claimed that these spending targets went against EU rules. Rome is burdened by the second-highest amount of public debt in the eurozone. There’s a 131.8% difference between borrowing and economic output there, but the government believes it will achieve substantial economic growth, while the EU’s predictions for Italy are rather gloomy. Nov. 13 was the deadline for submitting a revised draft budget. Rome did not comply. Now the EU leadership is threatening it with sanctions it until it falls into line. Italy could be slapped with a fine of €3.4 billion.

  The Italian government takes an independent stance on a multitude of issues. It is seen as Russia-friendly in its calls for lifting, or at least easing, the sanctions against the Russian Federation. Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte believes Moscow should be re-admitted to the G7. The Italian PM visited Moscow in late October,  hailing Russia as an essential global player and inviting Putin to visit Italy. Despite the EU-imposed punitive measures that are in place, Mr. Conte signed a slew of trade and investment agreements. Last year, Russia’s parliamentary majority party, United Russia, and Italy’s Lega Nord (Northern League), a ruling coalition member, signed a cooperation agreement. The regional council in Veneto, where Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini holds a strong position, recognized Crimea as part of Russia in 2016.

  Austria is another Russia-friendly EU member. Even the recent “spy scandal” that was obviously staged by outside forces to spoil that bilateral relationship, has failed to damage that rapport. “We are a country that has good contacts with Russia, we are aimed at dialogue, it will not change in the future,” said Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, speaking to reporters on Nov .14. The conservative People’s Party and the far-right Freedom Party — the members of the ruling coalition — are well-disposed toward Moscow. They don’t support the EU sanctions policy.

  Hungary is another Russia-friendly EU member. Last month, the European parliament voted to initiate the Article 7 sanctions procedure against Hungary. The government led by PM Victor Orban has been accused of silencing the media, targeting NGOs, and removing independent judges. Launching the procedures stipulated under that article  opens the door to sanctions. Hungary could eventually be temporarily deprived of its EU voting rights. In reality, the country is being punished for refusing to take in migrants.

  This is the second time Article 7 procedures have been launched. The first time was last year, when the European Commission set that article into motion against Poland over its judicial reforms. A unanimous vote is required to suspend Hungary’s voting rights and introduce sanctions. That move is likely to be blocked by Poland. It turn, Hungary said it would stand by Warsaw should the EU launch procedures to punish it. The two nations are united in their efforts to support each other and fend off Brussels’ encroachments at a time when the bloc is undergoing the most difficult times in its history.

  Hungary, Poland, and Russia are trying to draw Europe’s attention to the threat to democracy and peace emanating from Ukraine — a problem that has been largely hushed up by the EU leadership.

  Slovakia is another EU member state to nurture what some call “special ties” with Russia. It has never been happy with the sanctions against Moscow and has openly said so. Last month, its new prime minister, Peter Pellegrini, called on the EU to revise the sanction policy.

  A diplomatic row was also staged in Greece but, as in case of Austria, it may have clouded those historically close ties but has failed to sever them. Cyprus has always been friendly toward Moscow, but Nicosia and Athens are not in a position to protect their independence, as both are heavily indebted and dependent on foreign loans.

  The battle between Brussels and Rome comes at a time when Europe is preparing for the European Parliament elections in May 2019. Punitive measure taken by the EU against Italy will most certainly lead to growing public support of that government that is standing up to pressure in order to defend its people. It will increase the number of Italian Eurosceptics who win seats. With so many countries dissatisfied with the EU leadership, it’s hard to predict the outcome. There will soon be other people at the helm who hold quite different views on the problems faced by the EU, as well as on the bloc’s future. Everything may change, including the relationship with Russia and the sanctions that have become so unpopular and have resulted in many national leaders openly challenging the wisdom of such policy imposed by a powerful few.

  

• U.S. And Chinese Armies Hold Joint Disaster Drill In Rare Positive Exchange

  An extremely rare moment of US-China military to military cooperation? Ironically it’s in the area of emergency response and disaster relief at a moment when both sides are marching towards increasingly unpredictable encounters in the South China Sea, which could at any moment result in a catastrophe in its own right. 

  At a moment when U.S. officials are urging China to halt militarization of the South China Sea, Reuters reports this unusual tiny bright spot in Washington-Beijing relations:

  Soldiers from China and the United States wrapped up a week of joint disaster relief drills on Saturday, in a display of cooperation against a backdrop of worsening ties between the two countries over trade, the disputed South China Sea and self-ruled Taiwan.

  

  This comes as tensions are soaring between the world’s two largest economies and ahead of President Trump’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the G20 summit in Argentina starting November 30th. 

  The exercise was held in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing, where Chinese and American soldiers simulated natural disaster response and relief. Drills included practice rescuing people from earthquake-destroyed buildings and treating survivors’ injuries at a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) military hospital. 

  Military officials on both sides see the drills as crucial in building the kind of mutual understanding and respect that could avoid the type of unintended military action that could be the spark that leads to war, such as recent Chinese military intercepts of American and Western vessels in the South China Sea.

  One top Chinese commander, Qin Weijiang, deputy commander of the PLA’s eastern theater command, told reporters:

  Only through more contacts, more exchanges and cooperation in areas of common interest can we effectively increase mutual trust and effectively reduce misjudgments.

  So I think bilateral exchanges can start from humanitarian and disaster relief exchanges and expand to other areas of common interest.

  And the US side issued similarly rare amicable statements. Robert Brown, Commanding General of the U.S. Army Pacific, called the exchange “extremely important” and described: “Just as our top leaders work towards building a strong working relationship and understanding, we through confidence-building measures like this DME [Disaster Management Exchange] must also at our level build a strong understanding of each other,” according to Reuters.

  

  Such disaster relief exchanges have been held on an annual basis, with this year’s being the 14th time US and Chinese troops teamed up for the joint training. Last year the event took place in the United States; however, relations are currently their lowest level. But China’s defense ministry issued a statement expressing hope that such rare military cooperation can become a “stabilizer” for overall ties with Washington. 

  Michael Chase, a specialist in China and Asia-Pacific security at the RAND Corp, was quoted by Reuters as saying, “These exchanges remain important in that respect even if they aren’t going to solve broader problems in the relationship.”

  Meanwhile on the same day the rare, cooperative drills were wrapping up, Chinese President Xi Jinping addressed the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Papua New Guinea with US Vice President in attendance. The two leaders traded barbs in their speeches, with the Chinese president saying in response to White House accusations of Beijing using debt-trap diplomacy:

  No-one has the power to stop people from seeking a better life. We should strengthen development cooperation.

  And the Chinese president warned further against ramping up the trade war as well as potential military escalation, saying, “hot, cold or trade [war]” could spell catastrophe. “Mankind has once against reached a crossroad,” he said. “Which direction should we choose? Cooperation or confrontation, openness or closing one’s door?”

  It will be interesting to see if the US-Chinese humanitarian response drills will still occurring next year, or if relations hit rock bottom by then. 

  

• Afghanistan Takes Center Stage In The New Great Game

  Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Asia Times,

  Moscow hosted talks last week to promote peace in Afghanistan as neighbors and regional heavyweights eye the rewards of stability in the long-troubled land…

  

  In the “graveyard of empires,” Afghanistan never ceases to deliver geopolitical and historical twists. Last week in Moscow, another crucial chapter in this epic story was written when Russia pledged to use its diplomatic muscle to spur peace efforts in the war-torn country.

  Flanked by Afghan representatives and their Taliban rivals, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov talked about “working together with Afghanistan’s regional partners and friends who have gathered at this table.”

  “I am counting on you holding a serious and constructive conversation that will justify the hopes of the Afghan people,” he said.

  Back in the 1980s, the Soviet Union launched a disastrous war in the country. Thirty years later, Russia is now taking the lead role of mediator in this 21st-century version of the Great Game.

  The line-up in Moscow was diverse.

  Four members of the High Peace Council, which is responsible for attempting a dialogue with the Taliban, took part in the talks. Yet the Afghan foreign ministry went the extra mile to stress that the council does not represent the Afghan government.

  Kabul and former Northern Alliance members, who form a sort of “protective” circle around President Ashraf Ghani, in fact refuse any dialogue with the Taliban, who were their mortal enemies up to 2001.

  The Taliban for their part sent a delegation of five, although spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid was adamant there wouldn’t be “any sort of negotiations” with Kabul. This was “about finding a peaceful solution to the issue of Afghanistan.”

  Diplomats in Pakistan confirm the Taliban will only negotiate on substantial matters after a deal is reached with the United States on a timetable for complete withdrawal.

  Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stressed this was the first time a Taliban delegation had attended such a high-level international meeting. The fact that the Taliban is classified by Moscow as a “terrorist organization” makes it even more stunning.

  Moscow also invited China, Pakistan, India, Iran, the five Central Asian “stans” and the US. Washington sent just a diplomat from the American Embassy in Moscow, as an observer. The new US special envoy for peace in Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, widely known in the recent past as “Bush’s Afghan”, has not exactly made much progress in his meetings with Taliban officials in Qatar in the past few months.

  India – not exactly keen on a Pakistan-encouraged “Afghan-led peace” process – sent an envoy at a “non-official level” and received a dressing down from Lavrov, along the lines of  ‘Don’t moan, be constructive’. 

  Still, this was just the beginning. There will be a follow-up – although no date has been set.

  Enduring so much freedom

  Since the US bombing campaign and invasion of what was then Taliban-controlled Afghanistan 17 years ago, peace has proved elusive. The Taliban still has a major presence in the country and is essentially on a roll. 

  Diplomats in Islamabad confirm Kabul may exercise power over roughly 60% of the population, but the key fact is that only 55% of Afghanistan’s 407 districts, and perhaps even less, submit to Kabul. The Taliban are on the ascendancy in the northeast, the southwest and the southeast.

  It took a long time for a new head of US and NATO operations, General Austin Scott Miller, to admit the absolutely obvious. “This is not going to be won militarily … This is going to a political solution,” he said.

  The world’s most formidable military force simply cannot win the war.

  Still, after no less than 100,000 US and NATO troops plus 250,000 US-trained Afghan army and police failing over the years to prevent the Taliban from ruling over whole provinces, Washington seems determined to blame Islamabad for this military quagmire. 

  The US believes Pakistan’s covert “support” for the Taliban has inflamed the situation and destabilized the Kabul government.

  No wonder the Russian presidential envoy for Afghanistan, Zamir Kabulov, went straight to the jugular. “The West has lost the war in Afghanistan … the presence of the US and North Atlantic Treaty Organization [NATO] hasn’t only failed to solve the problem, but exacerbated it.”

  Lavrov, for his part, is quite concerned by the expansion of Daesh, known regionally as ISIS-Khorasan. He warned, correctly, that “foreign sponsors” are allowing ISIS-K to “turn Afghanistan into a springboard for its expansion in Central Asia”. Beijing agrees.

  A grand plan by China-Russia

  It’s no secret to all the major players that Washington won’t abdicate from its privileged Afghan base in the intersection of Central and South Asia for a number of reasons, especially monitoring and surveillance of strategic “threats” such as Russia and China.   

  In parallel, the eternal “Pakistan plays a double game” narrative simply won’t vanish – even as Islamabad has shown in detail how the Pakistani Taliban have been consistently offered safe-havens in eastern Afghanistan by RAW (Indian intelligence) operatives.

  That does not alter the fact that Islamabad has a serious Afghan problem. Military doctrine rules that Pakistan cannot manage the South Asian geopolitical chessboard and project power as an equal of India without controlling Afghanistan in “strategic depth.”

  Add to it the absolutely intractable problem of the Durand Line, established in 1893 to separate Afghanistan and the British India empire. A hundred years later, Islamabad totally rejected Kabul’s appeal to renegotiate the Durand line, according to a provision in the original treaty. For Islamabad, the Durand line shall remain in perpetuity as a valid international border.

  By the mid-1990s, the powers in Islamabad believed that by supporting the Taliban they would end up recognizing the Durand line and on top of it essentially dissolve the impetus of Pashtun nationalism and the call for a “Pashtunistan”.

  Islamabad was always supposed to drive the narrative. History, though, turned it completely upside down. In fact, it was Pashtun nationalism plus hardcore Islamism of the Deobandi variety that ended up contaminating Pakistani Pashtuns.

  Yet Pashtuns may not be the major actors in the, perhaps, final season of this Hindu Kush spectacular. That may turn out to be China.

  What matters most for China is Afghanistan becoming part of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). That’s exactly what Chinese envoy Yao Jing told the opening session of the 4th Trilateral Dialogue in Islamabad earlier this week between China, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

   “Kabul can act as a bridge to help expand connectivity between East, South and Central Asian regions,” Jing said.

  Pakistani Senator Mushahid Hussain Sayed said: “The Greater South Asia has emerged as a geo-economic concept, driven by economy and energy, roads and railways and ports and pipelines, and Pakistan is the hub of this connectivity due to CPEC.”

  For Beijing, CPEC can only deliver its enormous potential if Pakistan and India relations are normalized. And that road goes right through Afghanistan. China has been aiming for an opening for years. Chinese intel operatives have met the Taliban everywhere from Xinjiang to Karachi and from Peshawar to Doha.

  The China card is immensely alluring. Beijing is the only player capable of getting along with all the other major actors: Kabul, the Taliban, the former Northern Alliance, Iran, Russia, Central Asia, the US, the EU, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and – last but not least – “all-weather” brothers Pakistan.

  The only problem is India. But now, inside the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), they are all on the same table – with Iran and Afghanistan itself as observers.  Everyone knows that an Afghan Pax Sinica would involve tons of investment, connectivity and trade integration. What’s not to like?

  So this is the ultimate goal of the ongoing Moscow peace talks. It’s part of a concerted SCO strategy that has been discussed for years. The long and winding road is just starting. A Russia-China-driven peace process, Taliban included. Stable Afghanistan. Islamabad as guarantor. All-Asian solution. No Western invaders welcome.

  

• US Shale Firms To Spend $100 Million On West Texas And New Mexico Improvements

  Over a dozen top US energy firms have agreed to devote $100 million towards much needed improvements in West Texas and New Mexico, in order to help the regions cope with shortfalls in health care, education and civic infrastructure in the wake of the shale oil and gas boom, the group said on Sunday. 

  

  Chevron, EOG Resources, Exxon Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell are among 17 companies backing the Permian Strategic Partnership, as the consortium is called, Don Evans, a former U.S. government official and energy executive helping launch the group, told Reuters on Saturday. –Reuters

  The funds will be used to address labor and housing shortages, according to Reuters, along with traffic congestion caused by companies converging on the Permian Basin – the nation’s largest oilfield, where billions of dollars’ worth of oil and gas are expected to be extracted over the next several decades, according to experts. 

  “t’s a significant amount of money, but these are huge challenges,” said Evans, former US Secretary of Commerce from Midland, Texas. “We don’t have enough teachers. We don’t have enough doctors,” he added. 

  The consortium will work with regional and federal officials, as well as nonprofit groups, companies and educators in Texas and New Mexico. Evans – who became CEO of producer Tom Brown Inc. after starting his career in the Permian, joined the George W. Bush administration as Secretary of Commerce. 

  The group is assembling plans to hold meetings in communities across the region, so “everyone have a voice” in the undertaking. There is no timetable or plan for how the initial contribution will be spent. The group is recruiting staff and searching for office space, he said.

  In the last decade, the region’s many pockets of oil and low production costs have led to gold rush-like conditions in the Permian. Companies are pouring staff and equipment into the oilfield, which is expected to pump 3.7 million barrels of oil per day by December, four times its rate in 2010, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. –Reuters

  The unemployment rate in Midland hit 2.1 percent in October, vs. the national rate of 3.7 percent, leaving local employers – including schools and restaurants – under pressure as staff leaves for oilfield jobs. 

  

  As we reported in June, a battle has been playing out in Midland between employee-starved local businesses and multinational energy companies who are poaching local residents left and right for high-paying jobs as the latest Permian Basin shale-oil boom accelerates.

  

  Midland Mayor Jerry Morales has said that the boom is a double-edged sword; while the energy industry has increased sales-tax revenue by 34% year-over-year as of June, the 2.1% unemployment rate has resulted in a severe shortage of low-paying jobs around town – such as the 100 open teaching positions, according to Bloomberg.

  Morales, a native Midlander and second-generation restaurateur, has seen it happen so many times before. Oil prices go up, and energy companies dangle such incredible salaries that restaurants, grocery stores, hotels and other businesses can’t compete. People complain about poor service and long lines at McDonald’s and the Walmart and their favorite Tex-Mex joints. Rents soar. –Bloomberg

  “This economy is on fire,” said Morales – who is also the proprietor of Mulberry Cafe and Gerardo’s Casita. Unfortunately, the fire is so hot that the Mayor is scrambling to fill open jobs – from local government positions, to cooks at his restaurants. 

  In the country’s busiest oil patch, where the rig count has climbed by nearly one third in the past year, drillers, service providers and trucking companies have been poaching in all corners, recruiting everyone from police officers to grocery clerks. So many bus drivers with the Ector County Independent School District in nearby Odessa quit for the shale fields that kids were sometimes late to class. The George W. Bush Childhood Home, a museum in Midland dedicated to the 43rd U.S. president, is smarting from a volunteer shortage.

  And it doesn’t take much to get hired by the oil industry – which, as Bloomberg summarizes, “will hire just about anyone with basic training“… and it will quickly double, triple or x-ple their pay in the process. “It is crazy” said Jazmin Jimenez, 24, who flew through a two-week training program at New Mexico Junior College about 100 miles north of Midland. Jimenez was hired by Chevron as a well-pump checker. “Honestly I never thought I’d see myself at an oilfield company. But now that I’m here — I think this is it.“

  Meanwhile, the shale boom has also resulted in school overcrowding, a spike in traffic fatalities, drug abuse, and a massive strain on the power grid. 

  “Our roads are not designed to handle the amount of truck traffic we have,” said Jeff Walker, transportation training coordinator at New Mexico Junior College in Hobbs.

  Drug charges in Midland more than doubled between 2012 and 2016, to 942 from 491, according to police data. Traffic accidents also jumped 18 percent between 2016 and 2017 in Midland County, and 29 percent in nearby Ector County, according to Texas Department of Transportation data. –Reuters

  “They all agree that scaling up infrastructure is going to be a huge challenge,” said oil industry adviser Bob Peterson. “There’s a common agreement that there’s a whole bundle of problems.“

  

• Deception In North Korea? Nope, But A New Flavor Of Neocon

  Authored by Peter Van Buren via Medium.com,

  What is the state of diplomacy on the Korean peninsula? Are we again heading toward the lip of war, or is progress being made at an expected pace? Are there Asian Neocons fanning the flames for conflict in Pyongyang much as others did with Baghdad?

  

  A year ago, in November 2017, John Brennan estimated the chance of a war with North Korea at 20 to 25 percent. Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, said the odds were 50/50. The New York Times claimed we were “slouching toward war” with the North, on a “collision course.” National security adviser HR McMaster said North Korea represented “the greatest immediate threat to the United States” and that the potential for war with the communist nation grew each day. The U.S. lacked an ambassador in Seoul; Victor Cha was rejected by Trump because, according to “sources and reports,” he didn’t support a preemptive strike on Pyongyang. It was reported the U.S. was “imminently preparing for an attack on North Korea,” driven in part by hawks like Mike Pompeo and John Bolton.

  All that was wrong.

  Cha, it appears, didn’t in fact support what Trump actually was planning: not a preemptive strike, but a summit meeting with Kim Jong Un, held some five months ago in Singapore following a first try at courtship aside the Seoul Olympics in January 2018. World leaders meeting to talk peace is historically seen as a good thing. Yet the American media consensus was a president they believe is roundly despised globally conveyed “legitimacy” on Kim Jong Un, no matter that his family has ruled North Korea for some seven decades, and his country already holds a seat at the United Nations. No shortage of experts from South Korea universities and American think tanks were found to support those claims.

  The media generally ignored (in return for the U.S. postponing a handful of military exercises) “concessions,” which were deeply criticized by an American media which has failed to note the U.S. has actually resumed some exercises, the North unilaterally stopped ICBM testing (the missiles which might someday be able to reach the U.S.) and nuclear detonations. It released American hostages, and took steps to close down two nuclear missile facilities. Kim Jong-un fired top military leaders who dissented over his approaches to South Korea and the United States.

  Officials from North and South now meet regularly, and U.S. diplomats engage with both sides on an ongoing basis; Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has been to Pyongyang. Numerous practical steps have been taken along the DMZ to reduce the chance of accidents. South Korea’s unification minister in charge of North Korea issues Cho Myoung-gyon will visit the United States this week, where he is expected to meet Pompeo. This is the first time in four years for South Korea’s unification minister to visit Washington. On the last visit, in 2014, then-Secretary of State John Kerry refused to meet with his predecessor in line with the Obama (and Bush) administrations’ policy of ignoring North Korea in hopes the problem would go away.

  Yet the headlines this week in the New York Times and other major U.S. outlets scream of a “great deception” by the North Koreans, evidenced by a hardline think tank — helmed in part by Victor Cha — “discovering” North Korean missile facilities already long known to U.S. intelligence (Cha’s lo-rez commercial satellite photos are dated March, months before the Trump-Kim summit, so everyone who mattered already knew.)

  In a matter of a few paragraphs, Cha and the Times blow this “discovery” up to announce, without any evidence, “What everybody is worried about is that Trump is going to accept a bad deal — they give us a single test site and dismantle a few other things, and in return they get a peace agreement” that formally ends the Korean War. Mr. Trump, he said, “would then declare victory, say he got more than any other American president ever got, and the threat would still be there.”

  What is the real state of diplomacy on the Korean peninsula? Are we again heading toward the lip of war?

  Of course not. South Korea’s presidential spokesperson put those “new” missile facilities into the perspective Trump’s critics lack, saying “North Korea has never promised to shut down this missile base. It has never signed any agreement, any negotiation that makes shutting down missile bases mandatory… There is no agreement, no negotiation that makes it necessary for it to be declared.” In other words, there can be no deception where there was no agreement.

  To call what the Times discovered a “deception” is deeply misleading. The Singapore declaration and the inter-Korean summit declarations of April 27 and September 19 this year do not commit Pyongyang to disclose the sites. What is new to the Times is actually old news; Kim Jong Un in his January 2018 New Year’s Day guidance stated North Korea would shift to the mass producing nuclear weapons in such facilities. “The nuclear weapons research sector and the rocket industry should mass-produce nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles, the power and reliability of which have already been proved to the full, to give a spur to the efforts for deploying them for action,” Kim said. The Times in fact more or less acknowledged all this in September, before being suprised by it in November.

  And the Times’ big scary takeaway, that the old/new facilities are in caves, confuses tactical concealment with some sort of nefarious political “deception.” Did they expect the missiles to be worked on in the parking lot outside Kim’s villa?

  One issue only lightly touched by a western media obsessed with parsing tweets as their stab at journalism is the ongoing rush forward driven by the two Koreas themselves, what under any other media climate would be hailed as a huge series of successes but which falls in 2018 under the Trump Is Always Wrong Shadow. In a short time the two states established psuedo-embassies just north of the DMZ, where representatives from the two Koreas have met more than 60 times. The office has become a clearinghouse for over a dozen projects launched during the summit. There are plans for a massive binational project to link roads and railroads severed during the Korean War.

  North and South Korea have begun removing landmines from the border, drawn back some troops, and most recently held a third leaders’ summit in September in Pyongyang North Korean leader Kim offered to permanently dismantle two key ICBM facilities under the observation of outside experts. He also offered to negotiate further on the permanent shut down of the nuclear facility at Yongbyon. South Korean President Moon Jae-In, for his part, better than the U.S. understands the future is ultimately about economics, not nukes. Moon seeks sanctions relief as negotiations move forward (little is ever accomplished without some give and take.) “I believe the international community needs to provide assurances that North Korea has made the right choice to denuclearize and encourage North Korea to speed up the process,” he said this week in Paris during a visit with French President Emmanuel Macron. If the western media is correct that Trump is being duped, played, deceived, and cheated by the North, what must they think about the faster pace set by the South? After all, a U.S. miscalculation means we all switch from Samsung to Apple phones made in China, while South Korea risks being turned into a wasteland dotted only with signs for Nuka Cola.

  Left off to the side is that it has been only five months since the historic summit in Singapore. Obama’s agreement with Iran, which did not even involve actual working nukes, took almost two years to conclude. Cold War negotiations with the Soviet Union ran across administrations, extending the broader process into decades of talks, and were aimed at goals much shorter than full denuclearization. Five months is barely enough time to grow a decent garden, never mind resolve multinational problems that reach back to 1945.

  With North Korea, there is no history of trust, no basis of goodwill to build on. That all has to be created, built from scratch, as part of the heavy lifting of diplomacy. The ultimate goal — denuclearization — may or may not someday come to pass, but if it does it will be the result of years of more small steps forward than small steps back. Diplomacy is about moving the goalposts and embracing the long game, not playing chicken. It will require the North’s nuclear weapons to become unnecessary, as the North agrees to and is allowed to become so engaged with the global system that it finds itself no longer in need of such a powerful deterrence to attacks by its neighbors. Diplomacy requires one to at least understand the opponent’s goals and motivations, even if you don’t agree with them.

  There exists an industry of sorts devoted to portraying North Korea as an eviler than evil empire, with Kim as a parody of the movie Dr. Evil. These hardliners, ensconced mostly in universities in South Korea and think tanks in the U.S., have been around since the Cold War to make sure the case for the militarization of South Korea and American support for various South Korean military dictators never lacked public advocates. They act as mouthpieces for North Korean defectors with horror stories, and are quick to seize on anything to amplify the threat. Older readers will remember similar mostly defunct “industries” set up to do the same over the actions of Cuba, China, and the Soviet Union once (though the Red Threat gang is trying to make a comeback over Bond villian wanna-be Putin.)

  Victor Cha himself is a kind of one man gloom machine, writing regularly of the impossibility of denuclearization. His old articles focus fearfully on meetings canceled them (but since successfully concluded; fatalism ignores the future) he in fact represents a kind of Asian neocon, an industry dedicated to the impossibility of peace on the peninsula as long as the Kim dynasty remains in power. Cha’s home organization, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, for example, features multiple former Secretaries of Defense on its board and as trustees, and is well-funded by elements of the military industrial complex. Of the plan to link railroads across the DMZ, what any sane person would see as progress, the organization grumbled the “move is expected to increase friction with its traditional ally Washington over the pace of inter-Korean engagement.”

  So shame on those hardline groups — let’s call them Asian Neocons, for they want regime change in the North in the same way as Cheney, Rumsfeld, et al, wanted it in the Middle East — and shame on the New York Times for morphing its Trump-is-always-wrong editorial policy into presenting something long-known to U.S. intelligence as something new enough to declare deception has overtaken the diplomatic long game on the Korean Peninsula.

  As they did during the run up to the Iraq War, the Times is once again serving as a platform for those who cannot see or will not wait for a peaceful way forward.

  Deception? The deception, it is clear, is all (again) on the side of the neocons. They seek to destroy any chance of lasting peace with unrealistic expectations and by announcing failure at goals never actually set. Because if not diplomacy, then what is the alternative? Theirs is not pessimism, it is fatalism. Success instead should be measured by the continued absence of war and the continued sense that war is increasingly unlikely. Anyone demanding more than that wants things to fail.

  

• U.S. Envoy Seeks Peace Deal With Taliban By 2019 Amidst Direct Talks

  The U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan has said he hopes to strike a final peace deal with the Taliban by April of 2019, according to Reuters citing local media reports. 

  U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad led three days of talks between the United States, the Taliban and the Afghan government in Qatar where the Taliban has a political office, the culmination of months of attempted unprecedented face-to-face sit down dialogue between American officials and the Islamist insurgent group’s representatives. 

  Khalilzad told reporters over the weekend that he hopes “a peace deal is reached before April 20 next year”, when Afghanistan is planning to hold a presidential election. While six months is ambitious and a tad optimistic, it appears more about creating the conditions for a final politically face-saving American exit from the now approaching two decade long quagmire. 

  

  Khalilzad was appointed by President Trump specifically for the task of holding the controversial direct talks in order to find ways of ending the 17-year long American war in Afghanistan, at a time when officials have acknowledged the group holds nearly half of the country.

  On Sunday Khalilzad said the talks are aimed at establishing “peace and a successful Afghanistan, one that doesn’t pose any threats to itself and to the international community”.

  However, we could add it’s more immediately and realistically about American forces and advisers acknowledging it’s “time to cut and run” after an undefinable mission that’s become deeply unpopular with the US public. 

  

  Taliban officials for their part have demanded the US set a timeline for troop withdrawal and the release of senior Taliban figures from jails. Another round of talks is expected but with no date set yet. Commenting on the talks US Joint Chiefs Chairman General Joseph Dunford said on Saturday: “We used the term stalemate a year ago and relatively speaking it hasn’t changed much, but … we do believe that the Taliban know that at some point they have to reconcile.”

  Meanwhile there’s been a significant uptick in Taliban terror attacks on Afghan national forces, resulting in hundreds of casualties in recent weeks, ABC reports. 

  Earlier this month the newly-appointed American general in charge of US and NATO operations, Gen. Austin Scott Miller, told NBC News that the Afghan war cannot be won militarily and peace will only be achieved through direct engagement and negotiations with the Taliban. “This is not going to be won militarily,” Gen. Miller said. “This is going to a political solution.”

  

• "Brutally Cold Temperatures" Threaten To Devastate Black Friday Sales 

  As investors eagerly await channel check reports on this upcoming Black Friday shopping bonanza to confirm the US consumer is still propping up the economy, there could be some unexpectedly bad news that may disappoint Wall Street.

  First, the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) has released new weather models that indicate a massive blast of arctic air could spread across the mid-Atlantic and North East regions during the upcoming holiday week, crippling shopping intentions and keeping millions of Americans away from their favorite retail outlet of choice.

  ECMWF- Possibility of record cold temperatures through Black Friday 

  

  The brutally cold conditions could affect more than 120 million consumers during one of the busiest shopping days of the year.

  “A passing storm system will drag the coldest air of the season into the Northeast just in time for the Thanksgiving holiday. Temperatures will range from 20 to 30 degrees below average for the time of year later this week, leading to brutally cold conditions for many on both the Thanksgiving holiday and Black Friday. While colder temperatures and recent snow may trigger shoppers to get in the holiday spirit, brutally cold temperatures and wind chills may stifle some shoppers’ plans to venture out on Thanksgiving night and Black Friday for those doorbuster sales,” said Ed Vallee, head meteorologist at Vallee Weather Consulting.

  Shopping on #BlackFriday in the Northeast? Current morning low temperature forecast from the European model:

  Hartford CT: 2°F
  NYC: 16°F
  Boston: 15°F
  Philly: 16°F
  DC: 18°F

  Frozen shopping bags! pic.twitter.com/TTVl9MVhhm

  — Ed Vallee | Vallee Wx Consulting (@EdValleeWx) November 18, 2018

  Weather Prediction Center- “Highs 20-35 degrees below normal” 

  

  Wall Street has been struggling with uncertainty over a split Congress, monetary tightening by the Federal Reserve, tariffs, trade wars, peak corporate earnings, and the risk of a US slowdown next year if not outright recession.

  However, the next round of bad news could emerge from the US consumer, as Lipper Alpha Insights recently warned that retailers could experience weak holiday sales. Add to that weather models pointing to a mini ice age for much of the East Coast during the holiday shopping week, and it could be a perfect storm of bad news that devastates retail sales during the all important Black Friday period.

  “If we see any kind of disappointment in Black Friday sales, that is going to cause some real concern,” said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Cresset Wealth Advisors in Chicago.

  

  Of course, the flipside is that life-threating arctic temperatures will be just the “one time” excuse analysts need to explain away a dismal Black Friday, and with the latest retail sales report already a major disappointment, it now appears that it will be virtually impossible to get a true read on US shopping intentions – and capabilities – as such behavior will be severely curtailed by the elements, an excuse which Wall Street analysts will gladly use to perpetuate a thesis that all remains well if only “global cooling” were not part of the picture.

  

• What Market Turmoil: Sotheby's, Christie's Sell $2BN In Monster Week For Auctions

  Even as capital market are rocked by ever greater spikes in asset price volatility – most recently in nat gas and crude oil – at a time when BTFD no longer seems to be working, forcing professional traders to consider apocalyptic scenarios, with Bank of America even contemplating what would unleash the next “flash crash”…

  

  … it has yet to impact the ultra-high end luxury market according to the latest data from Christie’s and Sotheby’s auction houses, which collectively sold a near-record $2 billion in art in what Bloomberg dubbed a “monster week” for auctions.

  In the perennial race between the two most famous auctioneers, Christie’s sold $1.1 billion in art this past week, while Sotheby’s moved $835 million, plus more in jewelry and watches, according to Bloomberg.

  While it is notable that the high end market remains completely immune to gyrations in the market, what was perhaps most remarkable about last week’s haul is that it was padded by Christie’s $90.3 million sale of David Hockney’s “Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Two Figures)”, who eclipsed Jeff Koons as the most expensive living artist to sell at auction.

  

  The big winner is billionaire currency trader Joe Lewis who was the seller of the Hockney. The Hopper came from the collection of deceased businessman Barney A. Ebsworth. The buyers weren’t disclosed.

  As for Hockney, the eighty-one-year-old British painter won’t see a cent of the proceeds. In the U.S., artists aren’t entitled to royalties when a piece changes hands; they profit only the first time their work sells. The Hockney record topples Jeff Koons, whose balloon dogs sold, also at Christie’s, for a measly $58.4 million, in 2013.

  A new record for American art was also set by the company with the $92 million sale of Edward Hopper’s “Chop Suey.”

  Meanwhile, according to Bloomberg the highlight at Sotheby’s was the sale of a pearl and diamond necklace once owned by Marie Antoinette. The jewels sold for $36.2 million.

  

  The auction house said it’s had a 15% increase over last year in sales of impressionist, modern and contemporary works.

  The furious scramble to purchase art comes at a time when growth stocks – a traditional favorite of financial “art collectors” – have been hit hard, with many FAANG stocks in bear market territory, prompting some to ask if the world’s richest aren’t calling it a day in the stock market, and transferring their assets into a sector which has yet to suffer steep declines in prices.

  

• "Arab NATO" Gaining Momentum? Washington's 'Plan B' For Countering Russia

  Authored by Elijah Magnier, Middle East based chief international war correspondent for Al Rai Media

  All wars initiated or supported by the US establishment — from the occupation of Iraq in 2003, to the second Israeli war on Lebanon in 2006, and to regime-change efforts in Syria in 2011 and the occupation of a third of Iraq in 2014 — have failed in their goal of stoking the fire of sectarian war between Sunni and Shia in the Middle East. The failure of this strategy has pushed the US establishment towards two new options: the first, of using the media to reveal Saudi Arabia’s intention to harm the Iranian economy and assassinate its military commanders. The second is to promote and advertise for an “Arab (Sunni) NATO Army”. The goal is to keep the possibility of sectarian war alive.

  The struggle for dominance between Saudi Arabia and Iran has been going on since the fall of the Shah and the victory of the Islamic Republic in 1979. Nevertheless, today’s level of direct confrontation in various parts of the Middle East (Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Bahrein and Yemen) is unprecedented. This is partly the result of US efforts to throw gasoline on the fire of hate and competition between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

  It is against the interests of the US establishment to see the Iran-Saudi struggle wane because that would damage the US economy. Trump said clearly that he needs Arab money in exchange for the protection he is offering, otherwise “the Arab regimes won’t last for one week”. Accordingly, a state of non-war or non-competition between Tehran and Riyadh would significantly reduce the billions of dollars in US arms sales to the Saudis.

  

  The Saudi monarchy is well aware of the US need to sell them weapons. Indeed, Saudi media threatened the US in the aftermath of the assassination of Jamal Khashoggi, saying Riyadh would cease all hostilities towards Iran if Washington were to insist on accusing MbS of the horrible kidnapping and murder. This shows that Saudi animosity towards Iran is a double-edge sword used by both the US and the monarchy to reach their own sometimes mutually conflicting objectives. Saudi officials are happy to continue feeding Trump the sums of money he wants as long as he allows the kingdom a free hand in the region, mainly against Yemen.

  The other problem the US establishment is struggling with is the awakening of the Russian bear from its long hibernation since Perestroika in 1991. Moscow, with its successful intervention in Syria, and its involvement in Iraq and Lebanon, is becoming Washington’s biggest nightmare. The US plan for regime change has failed in Syria, and its manipulation of the extremist jihadists has not served US interests and objectives. Even more worrisome for the US is an emerging Iranian-Russian-Chinese alliance that signals the end of US global hegemony.

  Unwilling to surrender to the regional realignment, the US establishment envisions an Arab NATO — similar to the western NATO — to counter Russia in the Middle East. Such an alliance would serve to inflame sectarian fires between Sunni and the Shia.

  This plan might set the region in flames, but would also burn the ground from under the Russians, impeding their plans to stay and expand their dominance in the region. Washington’s thinking is that, if the US cannot dominate the ME dominance exclusively, then better for the region to go down in flames.

  

  The Arab NATO will be a Sunni army to fight the Shia. However, the dramatic military failure of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates against the poorest country in the ME, Yemen, suggests that this new Arab NATO will be stillborn.

  Nevertheless, this only indicates how far the US establishment is ready to go and what kind of weapons it is prepared to use to protect its global hegemony and to keep the Saudi money flowing. The “new Middle East” promoted by Condoleezza Rice in 2006 failed to defeat Hezbollah that same year. The Trump establishment is trying to impose a new wave of sanctions on Lebanon to fight against Hezbollah with little prospect of success. Hezbollah is stronger today than ever and is ready to go beyond its comfort zone to counter any US moves against it in the Lebanon, if necessary.

  The attempted regime change in Syria failed in 2018. However, US forces are keeping the al-Tanf crossing between Syria and Iraq closed to keep any substantial financial income from replenishing the Damascus treasury. The US refuses to eliminate the ISIS terrorist group in Albu Kamal, preferring to use ISIS to prevent reopening of commercial ties between the Levant and Mesopotamia.

  Furthermore, the US used its media and scholars to promote the partition of Iraq into Shiistan, Sunnistan and Kurdistan but failed in its goal of dividing the country when the Iraqi government succeeded in defeating ISIS and keeping the country united.

  Nevertheless, the US seems unready to surrender and is expected to use its unilateral sanctions on Iran to put further pressure on Iraq in the coming months. Baghdad is expected to reject any US demands to respect Trump’s sanctions.

  And last, the US is trying to twist the arm of the Palestinians by imposing its agenda on Jerusalem and threatening the security and stability of Jordan by refusing the right of return of Palestinians to their land and proposing an alternative settlement policy in Jordan. All this is being done with the support of Saudi Arabia.

  Washington today is more reckless more than ever and will do its utmost to trigger more wars in the Middle East. It is too early to talk about durable stability in the region so long as the US establishment seems determined to create instability and fuel sectarian war insofar as possible.

  

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